A Popular YouTube Channel Now Has the Fastest Exit and Highest ROI of Any Los Angeles Startup

Earlier this week, Dreamworks Animation purchased Awesomeness TV, a teen-oriented YouTube network with almost over 100 million total views, for $33 million, with up to $117 million in total payouts possible over the next two years, according to TubeFilter.

And no, Awesomeness doesn’t have any “cloud capabilities.” They don’t have any “platform advertising solutions.” They just make funny videos, and founder Brian Robbins — a veteran TV and film producer — is now freakin’ rich through videos like “Vomit Boy” and “Blow Up Guys — Tomato Dodge Ball.”

Dreamworks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg is essentially making the same bet on online programming as everyone else. The fact that we’re in an age of “media acquisitions” — pure content being acquired as opposed to technology — actually may mean things are settling out in the online media space.* The key now, of course, will be for Dreamworks to cultivate Awesomeness to be even more, y’know, awesome — teens have a sharp nose for selling out.

The company only raised a Series A round of $3.5 million last summer, and according to SoCal Tech, it now has the fastest funding-to-exit and highest return-on-investment of any investment in “Silicon Beach” history.

Check out their amusing “Broken iMac Prank” video here to get a taste of Awesomeness’ style. The video has a fair amount of censored curse words for a “kids” video — but hey, you don’t get acquired for $33 million without pushin’ the envelope!